How To Make A Video Essay: Writing 

eeek! ideas are tough. I find that actively hunting for an idea can be quite difficult- I have my best when totally relaxing and not thinking about work- but there are ways to do it. Try this method: start by thinking about relevance first- it's always a good reason to make an essay. What's coming out? Who made it? What was their past work like? What are its themes? Where are those explored in other films? Is there a notable thing about this film's style or plot that can be compared and contrasted with other works? And are there any older films having anniversaries, remakes or sequels? As an example I picked Mank (recent release, prominent director/actor, linked to film culture closely). Here's what I came up with asking those questions: - looking back at Zodiac - another Fincher film based on real life with extensive period reproduction - Hollywood on Hollywood: how US cinema reflects on itself, looking at Sunset Boulevard and other movies about making movies - Gary Oldman transforms: looking at how Oldman has adapted to different roles, probably Darkest Hour, Hannibal - more broadly- how black and white has returned to vogue and why. contrasting The Lighthouse (shot on film, square aspect) with Mank (digital production techniques, low contrast etc) So there you have it! Work on picking a film first and then brainstorm around that. Hope it helps. And don't do any of these videos or I'll tell on you

No worries mate, very glad you enjoyed it and hope to see your video essays soon! The rest of this series is actually already out- you can see them in this playlist: ru-vid.com/group/PLcIJkuWi50vCWWO0P_HTSz4L_1_IUiVKO

I too am a fairly new content creator and I want to get into making video essays, so as someone going into the same field - how do you personally find your potential viewers in order to research what type of videos they want to see? This for me has been my biggest weakness in RU-vid so far - not just finding my niche, but finding a gap in the niche by answering the questions that the people interested in the subject want answered

It’s good to watch a wide range of content within your chosen medium- so everything from hbomberguy to vox to bekindrewind to broeydeschanel to tiffany ferg- and then you’ll see in the comments what viewers are gravitating towards that content (as well as learning about different ways of making it!) Another good thing to do is see what people are searching for. You can use Google’s keywords tool for this, or you can open a (preferably incognito) window and search on YT for related terms. I use this by typing the name of the media i’m interested in, and then cycling through A-Z and seeing what the search autocompletes to. One of the most clicked search terms for my channel is ‘explained’, so my Dark City video has a tag with ‘dark city explained’.

thanks mate, glad you enjoyed it!

thanks, i'm glad to hear it- hope that your students enjoy making their video essays!

what an amazing teacher.

wishing you lots of luck in your boat-trip-into-video-games-essays (i've lost the metaphor here i think)

Awesome, hope it goes well!

Fantastic potential you have. Share your works. And get better. bit by bit. : )

thank you bud, greatly appreciated :)

Thanks so much, really glad you've enjoyed the video. I hope it enables you to get going on your video essay! RE: submitting a script for criticism- my commissioned work goes through approval with an editor and they will pull me up on research/grammar/style and so on. For my own work, I usually read and re-read a lot, trying to get the flow and sense right. Ultimately, practice makes perfect with that stuff; I think I'm writing better scripts than I did three years ago. But still, it's always worth sharing with a friend or someone knowledgeable. Certainly I do that with pronunciations, especially non-English names. I will always check both online and with a friend if I know a native speaker.

@@Indietrix Alright. Thank You, I appreciate the advice.

no worries mate, good luck making your video essays!

Really glad you like the video and fingers crossed it helps you make your video essays! I haven't looked into doing Skillshare yet. I make corporate video for a living so might feel a bit too much like work 😅

no worries, good luck with the project! just remember that a video essay sometimes ends up being a 10 page paper *as a script* and then a whole lot of work on top too😅

no worries, glad you enjoyed and do share it out if so inclined!

thanks so much bud, really appreciate that. glad to know this stuff applies across to gaming as well as film/tv. I watch quite a lot of game analysis essays from Game Makers Toolkit if you're looking for an example of good scripting in video essays- his work is consistently excellent.

@@Indietrix Mark is pretty much my main inspiration! Fantastic work

ah great, you're well ahead then :)

no worries, glad you enjoyed and good luck making your video essays!

Best of luck!

When it comes to summarising something very complex, it's best to ask yourself: what changes for the lead characters and their world? Answer that in one or two sentences, and you have a season summary. Then you can be more specific on particular episodes that need more explanation. I know that lots of anime essayists also use 'arcs' as an organisational device; maybe you could summarise arcs instead of specific episodes?

no worries, glad you liked it and good luck making your video essays!

no worries, glad you enjoyed!

no problem, glad you enjoyed it & good luck making your video essay!

that's great! i made two other videos exploring capturing footage, voiceover, and editing, so do check those out if you're looking for more guidance.

thanks!

You're welcome!

Thanks for the comment Anna- I was thinking about talking about pitching in this but honestly I'm not convinced I have a good enough strategy to recommend, I've only been doing commissioned work for just over a year! That said, here's my two cents. Pitching depends much more on who you're pitching the project to than on the project itself. If I'm pitching to an arthouse/indie platform like MUBI, my pitch is very different to a pitch for a commercial film mag or distributor. If you have a specific publication in mind to pitch to, try to identify what interest they'd have in it. Is there an upcoming re-release of the series? Is a lead star getting a bigger role in a new film/show? Is there a renewed interest in the property for any reason, or are its themes/content newly relevant? Once you have that in mind, a pitch is usually: "Hi, I'm pitching a video essay on x, in light of [x reason why it's relevant or interesting for their followers]. The video would focus on [x thematic/artistic/story element], looking at how [brief description of your video content]." Keep your pitch relatively short, make it interesting to the reader, give them a reason why it's worth commissioning for them, and give them a rough idea of what it would say! Send it off and don't worry if it's rejected- find another publisher and re-jig to fit their interests. Hope that helps and good luck with the video essay, it sounds very interesting!

@@Indietrix you're advice is much appreciated thanks again!

thanks very much for the ko-fi Anna!

glad it was helpful!

no worries mate, hope you enjoyed and good luck making your video essay!

you're welcome, have fun making your video essays!

If you want to make an overview, that sounds like a great approach. However, it’s worth considering if there’s something more you’d like to say about it: was the show a missed opportunity, ahead of its time, a misconceived mess, etc? Often, having a deeper throughline like that will help organise your thoughts (and hook viewers!)

@@Indietrix Ooh that's a good idea, I will take that into consideration! Thanks!😁

thanks so much, glad you appreciated it! I don't recommend downloading pirate movies at all, for a few reasons (it's illegal, they're often poor quality/don't necessary reflect filmmaker's preferred version, and they don't compensate the people who worked on the film). I create my own versions of the movies I cover, usually from blu-ray- you can find out more in the second video in this series, which is here: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-dxV3O-ZzMzk.html

@Indietrix Film Reviews Just watched it, SUPER HELPFUL! Thanks so much man, you're a lifesaver! 😀

@@FilGelabert no worries mate! consider sharing with your friends or online :)

thanks! Tell your mates about indietrix 😎

Hey, glad you found the video helpful. Copyright is complicated and I am not a lawyer, so don't take this as definite advice. I monetize my video essays, and frequently deal with copyright claims. Most of these are made by automated systems, and usually appealing it results in an immediate removal of the claims. To make sure you're on solid ground here, it's important to be sure that you only use as much footage as you need, that each use of footage is justified (used to illustrate a critical point or commentary), and that your use is transformative (has been sufficiently altered by editing and critical context). This is the usual criteria for judgements based around 'fair use' or as we call it in the UK, fair dealing. It's a legal defense and not a get out of jail free card, so it's important to have a good understanding of it and your own justification for using the footage.

Good luck, hope it goes well!

@@Indietrix thank you very much !!!🙏🏿

no i don't! i am working on some follow-up videos on this topic so will try to answer it there. the film grain background seen here is from FilmLooks, their 8mm collection, and the film burn is a free download from VisionColor that unfortunately i don't think they offer any more, but plenty more like it exist online if you hunt for it!

haha, glad this spoke to you!

hey, thanks for flagging this - I added my own captions, but YT also auto-generates its own, so you might have accidentally had those on. I've deleted them and checked my subs, so hopefully it's all sorted.

Ah fab! I was doing a video on Coppola at the time (you can see it on Little White Lies’ channel). Broey Deschanel also did a great vid on Coppola.

nothing wrong with it inherently- it's not my style so i don't have much to say about it! whenever I make a video essay I try to think first about who the audience is- who's going to watch it, what would they otherwise watch, and how will i communicate the message/argument of my video to them. if humour helps in that, great! if it's a crutch to pad out a video, bad. and of course, not all subject matter lends itself to humour.

faceless is easier to produce just in the sense that you don't need as much gear (just mic, vs camera, mic, lights). on the other hand, you spend longer in the edit on 'faceless' stuff, as you have more screentime to fill (because you aren't showing someone on screen talking). In the end, if you already have the equipment, there's not much difference logistically between the two styles- it's more about how you want to communicate with your audience.

@@Indietrix - Awesome. Thank you!

great that you have such a specific idea- best of luck making it!

@@Indietrix thank you!

yeah I think that's fine! you can approach an essay in all sorts of ways. I would still encourage you to provide evidence for specific points you make. Like, if you say, 'I always felt the story had an emotional resonance', it's better to follow that up with 'because X performance is good and Y character writing is complex in this particular way [... explanation]'.

I did another video on editing video essays with some advice! The free option for editing software is DaVinci, the best paid option is Premiere.

it's part of a pack of Super 8 footage I bought- from filmlooks if i remember correctly.

the idea sounds good! I would start breaking down the argument. For something that's clearly persuasive like 'why you should play Star Wars Battlefront 2', a good structure is: a) intro - what the game is and the critical/fan reaction against it b) why people don't like it- the main criticisms c) why you think people should play it- this should be reasons why you disagree with those main criticisms, it can also contain your personal thoughts on the game d) conclusion- play the damn game (this bit can be brief). your hardware/software sounds fine, i'm assuming you have a capture card sorted? no problem with a thick scottish accent, plenty of big tv/film/youtube personalities with a strong accent. if your vocal delivery goes up and down a lot/has an uneven volume, compression filters on the audio can help (iirc iMovie has an 'eq' setting which should contain this) hope that helps and good luck making the video essay, lemme know if you have any further qs!

@@Indietrix so how do I record my audio? 3rd party programme or something else? Should I say the whole essay in one go of split it in segments?

@@YerMawsDa check out the rest of this series for more on technical stuff. It’s been a long time since I used iMovie but I seem to remember you could record voiceover in it- otherwise Audacity is a good choice for a free audio recording app.

I used Pages for this! Thanks for the heads up though, I’ve just transitioned to Google Docs and need to write an AV script this week 😅

only via these tutorial videos!

yyyeaaah I think Mark's got great music taste and the whole set of 'Music For Podcasts' albums are fab, highly recommend!

😬 it's for the best, MAYBE. better video essays. and i'm sure i'll continue to be employed... 😬

@@Indietrix Beware! We all know what happened to Stephen King when he published On Writing.

🕵🏻‍♂️

i guess my main question is: why are you writing the guide in the first place?

@@Indietrix The shortest explanation I can come up with now: 1. Because it's fun. And I love teaching / sharing things. 2a. For the community. I don't want to sound pretentious with "for greater good" etc, but I do love the communities around video essays, both patrons, and many of the creators. 2b. Video essays have changed my life for the better and gave me a new perspective on some things, and helped me voice things more eloquently. I like to "pay it forward". 3a. For myself, because (with ADHD esp.) it's easy to get lost in it all. Making a flexible, but codified guide helps me not forget about different facets (and I'm sure you know better than I that there are thousands of facets!) 3b. For myself, because I love learning and figuring how things work. Even if I'll never be , analysing their process helps me appreciate it, and will make me better in tangential tasks in life. 4. And again, not to be pretentious, but I do think video essays are a great new art form - not "great" in the popularity, I get that even having 10M views is a drop in the ocean of popularity of TV/film/AAA games/etc. But I do think we have something neat going on (whether we call it a video essay or not) and it would be good to capture that in time and space, and help guide (or dissuade, in some cases) newcomers into it. While I know video essays aren't radically new (compared to just more-researched old-timey internet videos; indie documentaries; experimental documentaries; text essays; academic or trade show presentations), I do feel like they're in a good spot where there should be a more widely shared information about what it's really like; and (meta/cringe) perhaps a documentary about video essays and interviews with people making them.

@@Indietrix just do the work

Happy christmas lol

recursive video essay... i like it!

@@Indietrix fantastic Mate! 🤘😝🤘

hey- i have a business email listed in the channel about section. and you can tweet me at @willwebbful !

🤚

hey mate, yes was thinking of our chat on stream a month or so ago when making this! looking forward to seeing your essay!

@@Indietrix Thank you. It's funny, I have barely worked anything on the ideas I mentioned to you back then, but an idea popped into my head from watching a random video a few weeks ago. You really can't force inspiration.

totally agree, no point forcing it. you'll get there :)